You are literally my hero right now for fishing in those temps. 

When you see me fishing with full fingered gloves, you know it's cold out.

I’ve made it a point to not even ice fish when it’s that cold 

that’s pretty strong blue. but i’m beginning to think that you’re a crazy person.

 

?

Caught a couple this morning using a dark sleeper. 

I've had a bit of success with that bait. Do you swim or jig it?

I do a little of both. But mostly swim it. 

I've caught a whole bunch of spots and brownies and never questioned what was what.... Until today. Caught this one at the river behind my house. Has definite spot markings but I've never seen a brown spot.  

 

There are some great links with pics to help identify what species of bass you have there...Nine have been verified by the scientific community, but there are another 9-10  variations which are still being debated. True black bass species or hybrids?

 

Possibly a meanmouth? 

That's what I was thinking it possibly was. I know we have them in Arkansas. Just never heard of or saw one on lake ouachita or it's tributaries. I'm the bump man for a high school series and I'm glad someone didn't bring this fish to the scales lol

I caught a couple of these when I lived in Clarksville. The river behind my house there. 

On 2/15/2020 at 1:24 AM, Bluebasser86 said:

 

Temp got down to 1* on my way to the lake. Climbed all the way up to 9* by the time I got to the ramp. It was tough fighting wind, ice, and frozen fingers, but I did manage to get bit, including my first 2 smallies of the year. Only took a couple pictures because I didn't want to keep the fish out of the water long in those frigid temps.

 

Man, that’s dedication!

I think the coldest weather I ever fished was 25-28 degrees. A catfish pulled a rod off the dock that night and I went in after it ( and got it) The water felt warm compared to the air. When I got out though... I had to walk home ( about 600 feet) I think that’s the coldest I’ve ever been. Have not liked fishing in the cold since ( Not that we have much !! )

I went out back for a couple hours before the rain. Slight breeze, overcast, temps in the seventies. Felt like a fluke day. About the third cast I got this one. Breeze stopped and it got calm. Decided to pull out the zoom magnum lizard. Caught a couple and the bite slowed. Was fishing over the top of eelgrass, and clear pockets near shore. Found a nice bed but couldn’t see the fish. Decided to come back on the way home. Pulled out 5-6 more on the watermelon seed super fluke. Most were tight to the bank, probably bedding or about to. Saw a couple more beds coming home, but nobody home. Tried the first bed on the way back but same result. 
I am officially in a big fish slump, since I caught a 7 1/2 last summer.

 

 

The old man and I had a good day

 

36 minutes ago, N Florida Mike said:

I went out back for a couple hours before the rain. Slight breeze, overcast, temps in the seventies. Felt like a fluke day. About the third cast I got this one. Breeze stopped and it got calm. Decided to pull out the zoom magnum lizard. Caught a couple and the bite slowed. Was fishing over the top of eelgrass, and clear pockets near shore. Found a nice bed but couldn’t see the fish. Decided to come back on the way home. Pulled out 5-6 more on the watermelon seed super fluke. Most were tight to the bank, probably bedding or about to. Saw a couple more beds coming home, but nobody home. Tried the first bed on the way back but same result. 
I am officially in a big fish slump, since I caught a 7 1/2 last summer.

 

Temp in the 70's would definitely be a "fluke" here. Drove around looking for open water this afternoon.

It’s been a warm winter, even for here. We haven’t even had a freeze yet.?

Fellow member @Jermination invited me out on his skeeter today. I’m glad I went, this guys knows how to catch a bass! First he sees some favorable conditions on the depth finder and says we need to find rip rap. As soon as we find some he catches a fish cranking.  I had left all my jig heads at home and he said to try one of his neds. He boated one humpback 18” smallmouth with it also and missed another but I just kept trying other stuff. Then he says “seriously, I would.” After tying it on, Within an hour I caught a largemouth and 3 smallmouth (19” 17” and 15”) on a place he found fish on the graph. 

February ☑️

Jerkbait in Colorado

Finally got some good weather and a day off. Went to a power plant lake to give it a shot because the water warms up there faster than it does at the other lakes close to me. Got on the water about 9:15 and drove about 500 yards to a grass flat that I had caught some before. Tied on a 1/2 oz black/blue Project Z chatterbait and hooked up on about my 5th cast. Fished for a bit longer and switched to a 1/2 oz Spro Aruku shad lipless in Mudbug red. Caught 3 good fish in about 45 min. I weighed them just to see and they were from 2lb 4oz to 3lb 2oz. Fished the rest of the day with nothing. Finally caught another fish about 3:00 that was about a pound. Not sure what happened the rest of the day but as soon as the wind died and the sun came out it shut them down. I did better than a couple guys I talked to at the ramp that said they only managed a couple dinks. All in all, it was a good day. 

 

Edit* I don't think any of these are the same fish, but they might be. Trying to take pics using a ram mount and my phone set on burst mode. Not real good at it yet so I took a bunch.

Confirmed over lunch break that bass like the action of the suspending quake as much as I do.

18 hours ago, jbsoonerfan said:

Finally got some good weather and a day off. Went to a power plant lake to give it a shot because the water warms up there faster than it does at the other lakes close to me. Got on the water about 9:15 and drove about 500 yards to a grass flat that I had caught some before. Tied on a 1/2 oz black/blue Project Z chatterbait and hooked up on about my 5th cast. Fished for a bit longer and switched to a 1/2 oz Spro Aruku shad lipless in Mudbug red. Caught 3 good fish in about 45 min. I weighed them just to see and they were from 2lb 4oz to 3lb 2oz. Fished the rest of the day with nothing. Finally caught another fish about 3:00 that was about a pound. Not sure what happened the rest of the day but as soon as the wind died and the sun came out it shut them down. I did better than a couple guys I talked to at the ramp that said they only managed a couple dinks. All in all, it was a good day. 

 

Edit* I don't think any of these are the same fish, but they might be. Trying to take pics using a ram mount and my phone set on burst mode. Not real good at it yet so I took a bunch.

Nicely Done ~ 

Great Smile

Congrats 

A-Jay

Got together with a bunch of wading pals for a late afternoon/evening session on Monday. Conditions were textbook perfect, or at least as good as it gets for mid February up here. We had an arsenal between the 5 of us, and we covered alot of water between 2pm -8pm, and nobody got a sniff. Blanked.

 

I was cozy on my couch last night, still exhausted from Monday and wrapped in a quilt like a newborn when the phone rang. It was Joe. I was going to let it ring, but I picked it up in the end. "I've got a gut feeling about tonight", said Joe. "But I'm already in my feet pajamas", I said. He went to work on me and I became energized. I got clearance from the wife and off I went. You've gotta get clearance to go bass fishing deep in the woods at midnight on a weekday. Those are rules of marriage. It's somewhere in the manual.

 

We did OK for a northeast mid February midnight sesh. Missed a few, but got some too. It felt good to find some action after the massive skunkage of the day before. IMA crankbait, Nories Spoon Tail Shad, and the Dark Sleeper helped to warm up our frozen feet.

I was able to get out for a few hours the past two days and do a little fishing. Weather was sunny, air temps around 70°, water temps around 53° and pretty much dead calm both days. I didn’t get numbers by any stretch, but I’m happy with the ones I did get. Tuesday’s chatterbait fish was 3.81lbs and today’s was 5.86lbs on the same bait. It’s getting close and the prospect of another drought maybe helping the prespawn bite at this point here on the delta.